Wedding Shadowbox

I saw something like this somewhere and it inspired me to make this. It's a shadowbox filled with stuff from my wedding that I wanted to display, but keep safe. This was pretty easy and fun to make and I love looking at it hanging in our hallway.

 Materials:
12"x12" Shadowbox (about 1" thick)
Scrapbook paper for the background
Tape
Pins
Accessories you want to display





My shadow box included my veil, garter, hair comb, my husband's sheriff badge (we got married on a ranch), our program and one of the bookmarks that we gave as favors. The hardest part of making this was figuring out how to lay it all out so that everything could be seen, but look nice all together. As a rule thumb, the larger objects should go in the background and the smaller objects on top. Layering the items adds interest, just don't block anything important. And you should definitely try to use a contrasting background color paper. If all your items are light, use a dark background and if they're all dark, use a light background.


After playing around with it for about 20 minutes, I settled on this.

First, I laid the program down in the background and taped it to the background paper. Then, I taped down the comb of my veil so that the comb was under the fabric. I knew the book mark would cover this so I wasn't worried about about the tape showing. Then I attached my garter and the comb. These were trickier because I didn't want any tape or anything showing. I used sewing pins and poked them through the garter and comb and into the cardboard backing. If you get a shadowbox with a fabric background, it would be easier to attach. My shadowbox was pretty cheap, so it only had cardboard in the back. It was a little more difficult to get the pins to go through, but not impossible. I put the pins through the inside of the garter and folded it down so they won't show.

 The sheriff badge already had a pin on the back, so I just stuck that through. For the bookmark, I knew it would be pressed against the glass by my veil, but just to keep it from shifting after I close it up, I added folded over tape to the back of it.

Lastly, I decided that the top of the box looked a little bare, so I cut out a little calendar from a piece of scrapbook paper and circled our wedding date.

Then all I had to do was carefully put the frame around it and hang it without letting anything move. It took a couple tries to close it without letting anything move, but I think it's worth it! Just don't hang it in direct sunlight wear it will fade your precious items.

The Nikon D7000 is the camera I use for all my blog photos.

Thumb Print Tree Guestbook

This is a simple a fun guestbook for any wedding or event. I made one for my wedding and I thought I'd share how it's made.

Materials:
Watercolor Paper - 16"x20" work well and is a suitable framing size for a party of 100+ people. 11"x14" is good for about 50+, and 8"x10" is good for parties of 20+
Pencil
Pen - you'll need one that won't bleed if you want to paint over it with watercolors
Watercolor Paints - If desired
Frame - sized to match the paper
Ink Pads
Extra Pens
Hand Towelettes 

On a piece of watercolor paper, draw a simple tree. You may want to start by sketching lightly with a pencil and once you have a tree you like, draw over it with pen. Short sketchy lines give the tree a nice texture. If desired, you can draw your initials in the tree. You can stop at this point or use watercolor paints to color in the tree. 



It works best if you frame the image without the glass in front of it. I put the glass behind the image in the frame to keep it safe. Get 2 different shades of green stamp pads to use for the leaves. Michael's or Joann's will have a variety of colors. You may choose 2 standard green leaf color or you may want to use different 

colors such as brown, orange and yellow for an autumn look or pink and purple for a spring, floral look. Purple and pink might be cute for a girl's baby shower. Blue and green would look cute for a boy's baby shower. 

If this is for a wedding, the bride and groom should "sign" it prior to the wedding so they get a front and center spot. I choose to have mu husband and I stamp it right it the middle with red and blue ink(the colors of our wedding) and then draw little beaks, eyes, feet, a veil and a top hat  make them look like bride and groom birds. 

Make sure to get hand towelettes for people to clean off their fingers and have a basket or trash near by for the disposal of those. Amazon is a great place to buy the individually wrapped ones. Be sure to have a couple pens for people to sign with as well. After the wedding, place it behind the glass and enjoy it forever. I arranged mine in the center of a collage of wedding photos.

If your tree isn't turning out how you want, you can buy one from me on etsy!